Atlanta, GA– Southeast BIO (SEBIO) announced today it has selected 24 companies to participate in its Southeastern BIO Investor Forum, an event that brings together the Southeast’s most promising life sciences venture opportunities with the regional and national venture capital community. The SEBIO Investor Forum, now in its ninth year, will be held November 7-8, 2007, at the Pinehurst Resort in Pinehurst, NC. The gathering is the Southeast’s premier life sciences venture capital conference.

“Once again SEBIO has assembled an outstanding group of life science companies to present at the conference,” said David Pierson, co-chairman of the SEBIO Investor Forum selection committee and an investor with Intersouth Partners. “These companies are raising funds to help them pursue a wide range of business opportunities which investors will find compelling.”
“We felt that having the opportunity to present at the 2006 SEBIO Investor Forum was both an honor and a benefit for our company,” said Tom Amick, CEO of Aldagen. “Rarely do you have an opportunity to present to that many investors at one time. The interest created in Aldagen at that forum has helped the company in securing a stronger financial position for our future growth.” In December of 2006, Aldagen raised over $17 million.

“We received a large number of highly qualified applications this year for companies wanting to participate in the conference. It was very difficult to select the presenting companies,” notes Stephanie Adams, SEBIO’s Executive Director. “We are happy to report that nearly a third of the companies listed below are from the medical device sector, which is a substantial increase over previous years and reflects an overall trend in the industry.”

SEBIO is a non-profit, public/private partnership formed in 1999 to promote the growth of the life sciences economy in the Southeast, including the Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, Alabama, Florida and Georgia. The group seeks to build and maintain a strong coalition of investors, life sciences companies, service providers and state economic development organizations with a vested interest in the growth of biotech companies.

The annual conference, designed to stimulate venture investment, offers an “early-stage” event focused on best practices for newly emerging companies and a “presenting companies” event which showcases a second group of young companies that have already completed one round of institutional financing.

Early-stage participants will introduce their companies to specially selected advisory teams which will then choose four of the best to participate in the “Early-Stage Shootout” in front of the full conference audience. SEBIO presenting companies will make a 10-minute presentation to an audience of venture capitalists and angel investors during the Forum.

The two day event will also explore research, market, and financing trends with nationally recognized leaders from the investment and biosciences industries. Participants will include biotechnology executives, venture capitalists, investment bankers, and other industry professionals.

Selected Presenting Companies are:
Abeome Corporation (Athens, GA)
Altor Bioscience Corporation (Miramar, FL)
Biofisica, Inc. (Duluth, GA)
Cognosci, Inc. (Research Triangle Park, NC)
Ercole Biotech (Research Triangle Park, NC)
InnerPulse Inc. (Raleigh, NC)
Integrated Oncology Solutions, Inc. (IOS) (Raleigh, NC)
Metastatix, Inc. (Tucker, GA)
NovaMin Technology Inc. (Alachua, FL)
TIKVAH Therapeutics, Inc. (Atlanta, GA)
Transfusion & Transplantation Technologies LLC (”3Ti”) (Atlanta, GA)
Xhale Diagnostics, Inc. (Gainesville, FL)

Selected Early-Stage Companies are:
Agenta Biotechnologies, Inc. (Birmingham, AL)
CorSynergy, Inc. (Atlanta, GA)
Filtara, Inc. (Cary, NC)
FirstString Research, Inc. (Charleston, SC)
Jenken Biosciences, Inc. (Research Triangle Park, NC)
Nanovector (Raleigh, NC)
Oncogenomics (Durham, NC)
Optima Neuroscience, Inc. (Gainesville, FL)
Transgeneron Therapeutics, Inc. (Gainesville, FL)
Velocity Medical Solutions, LLC (Atlanta, GA)
Visioneering Corporation (Roswell, GA)
Transbarrier Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Tuscaloosa, AL)

The Southeastern BIO Investor Forum is an annual event of Southeast BIO, a regional nonprofit organization that fosters the growth of the life sciences industries in the Southeastern United States. The Forum was first held in 1999; SEBIO presenters have raised more than $2 billion in venture capital funding and IPO proceeds since the inaugural conference.

About Southeast BIO
Southeast BIO (SEBIO) is a regional nonprofit organization that fosters the growth of the life sciences industry in the Southeastern U.S. through efforts that promote entrepreneurship and bring together companies, investors, universities, and support organizations active in the development of the industry. Today, the Southeast is recognized as one of the fastest growing life sciences regions in the U.S. and home to more than 220 life sciences companies. A public/private partnership formed in 1999, SEBIO is committed to conducting activities that create regional leverage and facilitate the common interests and goals of constituents in the life sciences industry. The geographic footprint of SEBIO presently includes Alabama, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. For more information on SEBIO, go to www.sebio.org.